The invention relates to a flat knitting machine comprising: spring shaft needles arranged in needle grooves of needle beds, which spring shaft needles are respectively provided with a first forward needle butt always projecting out of the needle bed and a rear second needle butt which disappears due to the resilience of the spring shaft itself in the needle bed; slide jacks arranged behind the spring shaft needles which are respectively provided with a working butt and a front end which is, for the selective raising of the second needle butt slidable, under a spring shaft of the spring shaft needle; jacquard jacks which are arranged behind said slide jacks and are displaceable in sliding manner on them, having at least two butts; and a cam system for the selection and activation of the needles and jacks which has at least two withdrawal cam elements arranged symmetrically to a central longitudinal axis of the cam system and displaceable in the cam plane in the area of the second needle butt.
Such a flat knitting machine is, for example, known from German Patent DE No. 35 23 989 C1. The slide jacks are designed in that case as latch jacks, whereas the needle selection is carried out by the engagement of selection flaps on a selection butt of the jacquard jacks, thereby raising said jacquard jacks.
With the known flat knitting machine the needle groove milling can be achieved in the needle bed without a recess, i.e. in one milling process having a constant milling depth, without the full multiplicity of knitting technologies, including the transfer of stitches and knitting with different withdrawal depths within one row suffering therefrom.